Last week I began to hear friends reference what they were doing a year ago, as the Pandemic began to spread throughout the US. The impact didn’t fully hit me until a new episode dropped in a TV show I had been anticipating. I watched as characters I’ve come to love received the news of an upcoming two-week lock-down in their city and I felt heaviness and grief rise up in my body.

This tangible fear and a sensation of anxiety resurfaced simply by watching these fictional characters and I thought to myself, ” they have no idea what is coming.” Just like that, I found myself face to face with the alarm and the frightening unknown that pursued me a year ago. When I had no idea what was in store.

Listening to the language of my body, I began to process what it means to near the end of a time of trauma. As I sat with the heaviness that had taken over my body, I felt gratitude for the physical sensations that would not let me just rush to the finish line in celebration. Without fully processing and bearing witness to the losses I had faced.

Grieving the losses.

We each have our own list of losses. Mine looks something like this.

The loss of solitude as an introvert in a house full of extroverts. All stuck at home together. One of them is diagnosed with ADHD but all four of them display multiple symptoms. So things can get kind of wild.

The loss of meaningful work and income. Bringing so much anxiety. While I am back at work and our business is thriving, there was a very scary time when I didn’t know if we would make it. It seemed as if the grants and loans were going to the big guys who didn’t really need it while small businesses like our own were barely hanging on. Not getting the promised relief. When we were denied benefits, though I could show proof we had not made a profit for 3 months.

The loss of relationships. People I thought were friends but showed me that my life was not as important as their comfort. But my life matters. I finally believe that now and it affects who I will spend my time with when this is all over. But the pain of losing relationships will last a long time.

The loss of places of belonging. Toxic places of belonging are still places of belonging and the human spirit yearns to belong. Pulling away from places that do not honor my life or the lives of those who matter to me has not been easy. It hurts.

Parenting 24/7. Juggling home schooling on top of everything else. My senior threw his graduation cap in the air in front of an empty auditorium last May and I wanted to ball my eyes out. My youngest, a junior this year, thrives with people and lots of activities. Doing school work at home on his iPad has nearly been the end to all of us.

The loss of travel. Gatherings of friends. Work conferences with like-minded people. The loss of rhythms and routines that bring sanity. Quiet. Order. Stability.

religious trauma

There’s more. I struggle to know how to write these words. Before the pandemic, I had stepped away from the church. Not from faith, but from the organization struggling to represent it. Please know that I am not speaking about a particular church. But the representation as a whole.

The pandemic, George Floyd’s death, and the resulting conversations on race and privilege, followed by Christian’s response to the election, have brought painful clarity. I lost the church. Or the church lost me. Either way, I don’t think I will completely recover from this. Nor do I want to. I will keep following my faith and the prophet who thought nothing of breaking religious laws so he could be kind to all. Blurring the lines between those who were “in” and those on the “outside.” For me, any remote desire to be back on the inside, died during the pandemic. Too many “Christians” gave out the message that my life (and the lives of certain others) does not matter.

listening to the language of my body

These losses are heavy. And the only way out is through. Listening to the language of my body, the heaviness, the aches and pains. To hear what they are saying to me.

“We cannot figure our way out of grief… we must turn toward our experience and touch it with the softest hands possible. Only then, in the inner terrain of silence and solitude, will our grief yield to us and offer up its most tender shoots… So much is carried in our bodies. The wisdom that is held within our tissues is something that we have almost completely forgotten. And yet there is no awareness more situated in the present moment than what is found in our bodies.”

Francis Weller in The Wild Edge of Sorrow

Listening to the language of my body has become crucial to my well-being. That particular ache in one of my shoulders that flares up. I have long known it is brought on by stress and anxiety, my body’s way of getting my attention. Telling me I have taken on too much. Reminding me that I’m longing for comforting touch and a place of belonging. Or for rest, deep deep rest. I close my eyes and find the little girl who first felt the weight of the world on her tiny shoulders and I ask her how she is doing. If I listen long enough, this little girl tells me what I need. It could be a listening ear, paper and pen to pour out my soul, or a boundary she needs me to set. She is wise beyond her years and is always within my reach.

closure

Two more things come to mind as I think about moving into the light at the end of the tunnel.

I need a grief ritual. A sacred space shared with a few close friends, to grieve the losses and metaphorically put this pandemic into the ground so we can rise and move on. Francis Weller says,

“Unlike most traditional cultures, where grief is a regular guest in the community, we have somehow been able to cloister grief and sanitize it, denying its expression as the gut-wrenching and heart-breaking event that it truly is… ritual is the means whereby we can work the ground of grief, allowing it to move, shift, and, ultimately, take a new shape in the soul.”

The terror of this past year has brought me face to face with previous traumas. I’ve jumped bravely into the deep end and discovered new ways of being in the world. One thing I’ve come to understand is that victims who are rescued from trauma, have a much harder time healing from that trauma than victims who were able to use their own resources to escape. Naturally, sometimes being rescued by another is the only possible way out but the invaluable truth from my therapy this past year is that I am my own way out.

choosing life

In reflecting on the Pandemic, I am convinced that I did what I could to stay safe and keep others safe. There were things beyond my control, but now, as we near the end, there is something I can do, for myself. I can get the vaccine as soon as I am able. I can be my own way out. It is one way of taking this trauma and putting it into the ground.

I know that this is a controversial topic for some. And yet for me, it is about choosing life. For myself and those around me. It has hurt a lot to feel as if my life hasn’t mattered to some people this past year. And I can’t change that. I can make certain however, that those around me know beyond a doubt that their health, well-being, and yes, even their lives, matter to me.

The journey from grief to glory starts by sitting with death and loss. Listening to the language of the body. Letting grief be an honest conversation of soul with the outer world . Letting flow what must flow. In the end, we must find a way to choose life.

Click on the button above to send me an email and I will let you know when new posts are up! If you or someone you love is in the closet, or if you are struggling with your own guttural grief and need someone to talk to, email me. I may not have time to answer you but I will read it and hold you in my heart.

Photo courtesy of Adrienne Gerber Photography.